Yohmor or Yohmor al Beqaa ( ar, يحمر (البقاع الغربي) ) is a large village in the Beka'a Valley of

Lebanon Lebanon ( , ar, لُبْنَان, translit=lubnān, ), officially the Republic of Lebanon () or the Lebanese Republic, is a country in Western Asia. It is located between Syria to Lebanon–Syria border, the north and east and Israel to Blue ...

, situated in the

Western Beqaa District Western Beqaa District ( ar, قضاء البقاع الغربي) is an administrative district in the Beqaa Governorate of the Republic of Lebanon. The capital is Joub Jannine which has a population of 12,000. Main cities and towns West Beqaa h ...

in the south of the

Beqaa Governorate Beqaa ( ') is a governorate in Lebanon. Districts Since 2014, Beqaa Governorate contains three districts: * West Beqaa * Rashaya * Zahle A law was passed in 2003 to separate Baalbek District and Hermel District from Beqaa Governorate to form a ...

. It lies south of

Sohmor Sohmor ( ar, سحمر) is a small town in the Beka'a Valley of Lebanon, situated in the Western Beqaa District and south of the Beqaa Governorate. It lies south of Lake Qaraoun on the Litani River. It lies southwest of Machgara, northeast of ...

History

In 1838, Eli Smith noted ''Yahmur'' as a village on the West side of the Beqaa Valley. On 15 April 1996, during the seventeen day bombardment of south Lebanon by the Israeli army and

air force An air force – in the broadest sense – is the national military branch that primarily conducts aerial warfare. More specifically, it is the branch of a nation's armed services that is responsible for aerial warfare as distinct from an ...

, the hydroelectric power station on the

Litani River The Litani River ( ar, نهر الليطاني, Nahr al-Līṭānī), the classical Leontes ( grc-gre, Λέοντες, Léontes, lions), is an important water resource in southern Lebanon. The river rises in the fertile Beqaa Valley, west of B ...

, one kilometre north-east of Yohmor, was destroyed in an air raid. A

HRW Human Rights Watch (HRW) is an international non-governmental organization, headquartered in New York City, that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. The group pressures governments, policy makers, companies, and individual human ri ...

report published in 2011 described Yohmor as having a population of 7,500, consisting of around 400 families. 60% of the workforce where involved in agriculture. 150 families made their living growing tobacco. On 12 August 2006, two days before the end of the Israeli attack on Lebanon, Yohmor was blitzed by the

IDF IDF or idf may refer to: Defence forces * Irish Defence Forces * Israel Defense Forces *Iceland Defense Force, of the US Armed Forces, 1951-2006 * Indian Defence Force, a part-time force, 1917 Organizations * Israeli Diving Federation * Interac ...

with

155mm 155 mm (6.1 in) is a common, NATO-standard, artillery caliber. It is defined in AOP-29 part 1 with reference to STANAG 4425. It is commonly used in field guns, howitzers, and gun-howitzers. Land warfare The caliber originated in France ...

artillery and air strikes. Thousands of

cluster bombs A cluster munition is a form of air-dropped or ground-launched explosive weapon that releases or ejects smaller submunitions. Commonly, this is a cluster bomb that ejects explosive bomblets that are designed to kill personnel and destroy vehicl ...

landed on the village. Most of the inhabitants had fled the war zone and only twenty families remained. Unexploded bomblets littered the roads, gardens, on roofs and inside houses. Investigators found US made CBU-58 and BLU-63BLU-63
/ref> bombs as well as missile fragments date stamped 1973. In the following two months, as villagers returned to their homes, one person was killed and five injured by these weapons.

References

Bibliography

External links

Localiban Populated places in Western Beqaa District {{Lebanon-geo-stub